A sports car that almost makes you want to break out your Birkenstocks to drive...

The motto of Lotus engineering has always been "performance through light weight." Not only has this created some great handling cars in the years since its founding by Colin Chapman, it has made them relatively fuel efficient.

For the 2008 British Motor Show, Lotus is set to take this inadvertently green approach further by taking some deliberate steps to make a more ecological friendly automobile and introducing their concept car, the Lotus Eco Elise. Composite body panels and the seats are made of hemp. Those two rectangles on the roof? Solar panels to power the electrical systems. And if you thought Lotus couldn't make the Elise any lighter, they somehow managed to shave off an additional 70 pounds off the weight.

The dream lives on. Sigh.

On a side note, this is one of a few new concept cars I've seen incorporating solar panels. Mercedes-Benz has a rumored model with solar panels incorporated into its roof to power the air conditioning system to cool off the car while it's parked. Most of the Kool-Aid Gang probably remembers a certain VW Rabbit running around our old stomping grounds with a unwieldy solar panel on it's top that essentially did the same thing. Crazy how long it's taken for a relatively ingenius idea to finally start making its way into consumer products.

Cue the "waa-waa" horns and the James Bond theme music...

As the Kool-Aid Gang probably knows, my fascination with Lotus cars began with the Espirit back when I first saw Roger Moore drive one straight into the depths of the sea and watched it turn into a submarine in The Spy Who Loved Me. Obviously, it was a preposterous idea that a car could submerge underwater like that, but for a young kid like me with no sense of the laws of physics, it was just super-cool--you might even say, dangerously cheesy.

Anywho, some guy in Switzerland has actually made this a reality, using the modern Lotus (an Elise) as the framework for his own Q-Branch vehicle. I guess it's not truly the James Bond submarine car--it has an open top in order to overcome buoyancy issues and you basically have to use a diving respirator to breathe. Still, it's kind of a fun idea and just goes to show you what one can do with too much money on their hands.

My Lotus fantasies never end...

Coming soon from the engineers across the pond in England is the latest example of pure driving excitement from Lotus.  The 2-Eleven is completely built for a track.  No air conditioning, no stereo--it doesn't even have a windshield.  All of this saves insane amounts of weight making it only 1,477 pounds and gives it a 0-60 mph time of 3.8 seconds using a tiny 1.8 liter engine.  This is like a go-kart on steroids!  

As I was reading about this car on Wired magazine's website, I followed the links to the official Lotus website, which has been heavily updated since I last perused it a few months ago.  I was a bit surprised that they don't make the Lotus Espirit anymore, with or without submarine capabilities.  

Anywho, I want the Kool-Aid Gang to promise me that if any of you stumble across all sorts of disposable income, you will take us all to the Lotus Performance Driving School.  I'd suggest we all meet up there sometime soon, but the course costs $995 for only a one day program--not the sort of cash I've got lying around.  Ah well.  More to dream about, I guess.  I recall Fandango and I briefly playing around with the idea of making a trip out to Germany, renting out a couple of Porsches, and going nuts on the Autobahn.  Maybe that's a more realistic endeavor.  Who's in?

Rubbin' is racin'...

I'd apologize for the excessive posting of Lotus videos today, but then I remembered there's no such thing as too many Lotus videos! Anwyho, a Lotus Elise race? How awesome is that? I'm not sure I'd have the guts to drive like this:

I should have been a car magazine journalist...

The Tesla Roadster is finally set to be released for sale to the public (or I guess that's sold to the public, since the first batch was already reserved a long time ago), so drivers from various mainstream automobile magazines were invited to test it out. The three second 0 to 60 mph times have been slowed down to somewhere around 5.3 seconds due to some cutbacks to the electric engine, but otherwise this car sounds just as impressive as when it was announced a couple of years ago. The chassis and handling was based on the Lotus Elise, yet somehow the test drivers say it's a bit more refined than the ride in the Lotus. Needless to say, I like this car.

Here's a preview from Automobile magazine. Especially listen to it take off around the :50 second mark--it sounds like something out of a science fiction movie:



And for a slightly more in depth review from Motor Trend:

Go, Speed!

The new trailer for Speed Racer just came up tonight. It's a bit Dick Tracy-esque, but I think it will work a lot better for this movie. I'm already getting jazzed:



Alas, the closest I'll probably ever get to being Speed Racer in this world is dreaming about that ever elusive Lotus:



And did you know that the Lotus Elise/Exige is glued together--literally. At about 3:40 into this video, you'll briefly catch a glimpse of a Lotus factory worker with a bottle of glue, beading the adhesive onto a seam.



Someday. Someday.

Torture...

I've seen three of these around town just today alone. And they're not the same one just seen multiple times because they were all different colors. Either this is a cruel joke to make me want one even more or it's telling me that they're becoming way too common. Maybe I need to go back obsessing about my original Lotus dream, the Esprit.

I know I said no pornography on this blog...

...but I couldn't resist. The Speed Channel used to air reruns of a couple of automobile shows from the UK called Fifth Gear and Top Gear that were always pretty fun to watch, and were nothing like the yawners here in the States. So I was pretty giddy when I found these videos from an episode of Top Gear highlighting the Lotus Exige, the hardtop souped-up version of the Elise. If I were less classy, I'd insert some vulgar comments about sexual climax about now. Instead, I will just say, I really enjoyed these. It corners like it's on rails! Take a peek:


Exige Lotus - video powered by Metacafe


Top Gear Exige & Stig - video powered by Metacafe

And if you're looking for something with a bit more polish, here's a video of the Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder, which isn't too shabby either:


Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder - video powered by Metacafe